𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐞𝐦𝐢𝐬'𝐬 𝐡𝐞𝐢𝐫 • 𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘤𝘺 𝘫𝘢𝘤𝘬𝘴𝘰𝘯

Saying Goodbye

Y/n Pov:

We were the first heroes to return alive to Half-Blood Hill since Luke, so of course, everybody treated us as if we'd won some reality-TV contest. According to camp tradition, we wore laurel wreaths to a big feast prepared in our honour, then led a procession down to the bonfire, where we got to burn the burial shrouds our cabins had made for us in our absence.

My shrewd was beautiful. My fellow Apollo cousins had made it. It was silver silk, with an embroidered deer, moon and bow and arrow. It was then painted—with paint for clothes—three beautiful mountains. I was sad to burn it.

"We made it with extra love," said my eight-year-old cousin, Will Solace.

"Yeah, 'cause you're one of a kind," said Lee Fletcher, my other cousin.

"Like your shrewd."

"Aww, thanks!" I thanked.

As Apollo's cabin led the sing-along and passed out s'mores, Grover was surrounded by many kids, who were admiring the brand-new searcher's licence he'd received from the Council of Cloven Elders. The council had called Grover's performance on the quest "Brave to the point of indigestion. Horns-and-whiskers above anything we have seen in the past."

Even Dionysus's welcome-home speech wasn't enough to dampen my spirits. "Yes, yes, so the little brat didn't get himself killed, and now he'll have an even bigger head. Well, huzzah for that. In other announcements, there will be no canoe races this Saturday...."

I moved back into cabin eight and was happy to smell the smell of pine and wild inside the cabin. I took some singing lessons with my cousins, and we're even talking about writing a song!

Not only that, but I thought about what Percy had proposed, going to Atlantic High. I suggested the idea to Annabeth, and she completely agreed, telling me if I was going to take risks, she would take risks too. So now she's going back home, to her father.

On the Fourth of July, the whole camp gathered at the beach for a fireworks display by cabin nine. BeingHephaestus's kids, they weren't going to settle for a few lame red-white-and-blue explosions. They'danchored a barge offshore and loaded it with rockets the size of Patriot missiles. The finale was supposed to be a couple of hundred-foot-tall Spartan warriors who would crackle to life above the ocean, fight a battle, then explode into a million colours. 

As Annabeth, Percy and I were spreading a picnic blanket, Grover showed up to tell us goodbye. He was dressed in his usual jeans and T-shirt and sneakers, but in the last few weeks, he'd started to look older, almost high-school age. His goatee had got thicker. He'd put on weight. His horns had grown at least an inch, so he now had to wear his Rasta cap all the time to pass as human. 

"I'm off," he said. "I just came to say ... well, you know." 

I tried to feel happy for him. After all, it wasn't every day a satyr got permission to go look for the great god Pan. But it was hard saying goodbye.

Annabeth hugged him. She told him to keep his fake feet on. 

I hugged him tightly and kissed him on the forehead, wishing him good luck.

Percy asked him where he was going to search first. 

"Kind of secret," he said, looking embarrassed. "I wish you could come with me, guys, but humans and Pan ..." 

"We understand," Annabeth said. 

"Have you got enough tin cans for the trip?" I asked him.

"Yeah."

"And you remembered your reed pipes?" 

"Jeez, Y/n," he grumbled. "You're like an old mama goat."